Welcome back to Martian Messages! If you’re new here, welcome! If you’re a returning fan, I’m so glad to see you here.
Before we get started I want to provide a few disclaimers:
COPYRIGHT DISCLAIMER: This production consists of the original blog writings by Andy Weir. The novel published by Random House is copyrighted, but the book presented here is permitted for distribution, given that said distribution is free and no person receives monetary gain from the release.
Because this was published on a blog, there are many spelling and grammar mistakes. The book you may be familiar with was sent through an editing firm, which removed many of these mistakes. An editing firm I am not, and I felt it would not be true to the nature of this project if I fixed any issues. If you see any mistakes, no you didn’t.
INFORMATION DISCLAIMER: I have tried to match the dates in the book with the dates in real life. Since Martian sols are not the same length as Earth days, I have done my best to convert between the two time systems. I have also attempted to place unmarked events in their proper places on the timeline, but this is all based on guesswork, so it may not be entirely accurate.
Please keep this in mind as you are reading. Now, the book starts on November 12 (aka Sol 6), but for the sake of chronology, I’ll be posting several entries over the next couple of days. Several people have asked for the companion short stories “Diary of an Ass Can” and others featured in From the Files of Mark Watney, so those will be posted over the next three days and will be labeled accordingly. The 5 sections after that are from the book itself and considered a set, sometimes called a variation of “Creation of Plastic.” Because you’re reading them before the rest of the book, I took the liberty of adding a note where they were originally placed (in case you forgot, or want to refresh your memory). I will not repost Creation of Plastic. (If you partook in Dracula Daily, this is sort of a reverse situation of the Demeter’s log.)
Whew! Now that that’s all said, I hope you enjoy Martian Messages!
Diary of an Ass Can
November 13th
(Moderator’s Note: 364 Days Before Sol 6)
Holy crap. I mean seriously. Holy crap.
Holy.
Crap.
I can’t… I can’t believe it. There it is. My name on the board. They picked me over thousands of other astronaut candidates. After countless hours of physical and mental testing, ten bajillion psych evaluations, and endless pretraining courses, they picked me.
It’s locked in. It’s a done deal. I’m on the Ares 3 primary crew.
I’m going to Mars.
Holy crap, I’m going to Mars!
I don’t recognise the other names on the list, even though I know a lot of other AssCans. We hang out and commiserate about the selection process. But only six people have been chosen out of thousands. I’ve just never met any of these others.
According to the list, their names are Lewis, Martinez, Johanssen, Vogel, and Beck. And naturally, there’s one more name on that list: Watney! My name’s on the list! I’m going to Mars!
My mission role is “mechanical engineer” which means I’ll fix stuff that breaks during the trip. And my science role is “botanist”. I’ll be doing plant experiments on the surface.
Mars is going to get botany’d like never before! And I mean that literally. It’s like 4.5 billion years old and (so far as we know) nothing’s ever grown on it. Ares 1 and 2 didn’t have any plant-related experiments. Hopefully, I’ll be able to really learn how plant growth works on the Red Planet.
They haven’t posted the egress order yet, but if they follow their usual pattern, the mechanical engineer leaves the lander fifth. So overall that’ll make me the seventeenth human to set foot on Mars.
It’ll take months to get there, and we’ll only be spending 31 sols (Martian days) on the surface. Then it’s several months to get back home. It’ll be a tight schedule of experiments and EVAs while we’re there.
I wish there were a way to spend more time on the surface. But oh well. 31 sols will have to do.
I’m going to Mars!
From the Files of Mark Watney
I Made It
(Moderator’s Note: ~350 Days Before Sol 6)
Dear Mom
I just got the news from NASA. They’re putting me on the crew of Ares 3. I’m going to Mars!
Dad, I assume you’re reading now. Mom probably wadded up the letter and threw it across the room. So, hey, Dad, I’m going to Mars. How awesome is that? Anyway, please tell Mom to continue reading.
Mom, I’ll be fine. NASA has warehouses full of nerds who spend all day figuring out how to make me not die. And it’s not like this is the first Mars mission or anything. It’s the third. I know you’re worried there’ll be another near disaster like Ares 2, but that decompression was a fluke and everyone survived anyway. They didn’t even have to abort the mission. You’ll feel better when you meet Commander Lewis. She’ll be in charge. She’s a veteran of six missions, two of them long-term stays on the space station. She’s far and away the most capable and reliable person I’ve ever known. She knows what she’s doing, and she’ll make sure we get back all right.
Oh, one minor side note. I’ll actually be on Mars for Thanksgiving, so I’m going to miss the usual family gathering in Chicago. Maybe it’s for the best. I always end up sleeping on the couch when the family’s all there. You know what that means? It means I go to sleep last and wake up second.
They haven’t picked a landing site yet, but they’re thinking Acidalia Planitia. There used to be a river outflow there, so it should have a good cross-section of geology. I’ll be able to do botany experiments on lots of different kinds of soil, and oh my god, it’s starting to dawn on me that they’re actually going to send me to another planet!
Head between my knees, deep breaths.
Okay, I’m feeling better now. Anyway, Mom, nothing to worry about! We have two weeks off before they start hammering us with training, so I figured I’d come out and visit. Then you can tell me how much you hate the idea of your baby boy riding a giant bomb to a planet that makes the Sahara Desert look like a tropical paradise. I’ll be seeing both of you soon,
Mark
P.S. I’d appreciate it if you could show this letter to my fourth-grade teacher, Mrs. McGreevy. I think she still teaches at Jackson Elementary. She once told me I’d never amount to anything. Tell her I’m an astronaut now and that I’m going to Mars. Then say, and try to make it really snide. Thanks!
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